Mama Shower

Below are the pictures that were taken of the Baby Shower. As you can tell, it was a beautiful party and I am happy to say that the Soon-to-be-Mommy was very happy with with her swanky party.

Recovery and Restarting

"Where thou art, that is home" - Emily Dickinson

It has been a busy time for our little family. My friend's baby shower was beautiful. In the next few days I'll upload the pictures that we took and post them on here for all to see the decorations that came out just as beautiful as a field of lavendar swaying in the breeze. Okay, maybe not that gorgeous. But pretty damn close.

Our life, as I mentioned, has been pretty busy. Last weekend we had the family baby shower in Olympia. The drive wasn't too bad to Olympia, the food at Vick's Pizza was scrumptious (I always love pizza), the family members that I met were very sweet, but taking my husband to the city of his Alma Mater is always worth it. He always has this wistful...aura, which is a new age word I'm not fond of using, around him. Though, much like Ellensburg for myself, he has out grown the town and both the town and the man have moved on to bigger things to worry about. But I still love our occassional trips to that city as we do have some family there.

As mentioned earlier the baby shower that I was planning was wonderful. I didn't make cupcakes, thank goodness. I was running out of time on just about everything. Planning a baby shower and working and living a sane life do not go together. It reminded me of that joke diagram for college where you can only choose two options of three with the three options being good grades, social life and getting plenty of sleep. Thankfully, the end has been found and we are past the insanity that was baby shower planning.

This coming weekend has baby birthing classes, which exhaust me just to think about!

Today, though, I have been suffering from a bit of a cold and stomach ache (too much stress!). And have been in recovery mode. This week is also the beginning of what I hope to be a much needed self improvement start. My intention is to work out in the morning, eat healthy and wholesome foods, and overall take care of myself in the long run. Hopefully I'll be able to stick with it. Thankfully this bug is mostly gone it feels like. Now I'm going to take time to relax and hang with my husband.

A Mama Shower

My all-time best friend, Stephanie, is quite pregnant and the time on her pregnancy is ticking down. She is due on November 18 and due to some unfortunate circumstances, the man that was involved with the creation of this beautiful baby is not involved. Which means that in addition to being her best friend and supportive during all of this, I am also her birth partner, child's godmother, and baby shower planner. Keep in mind I've never had a child, let alone thrown a baby shower. I have been to a few baby showers and I know what people hate (most of the traditional things such as games) and what people enjoy. To be honest, I'm excited for the birthing classes and the number of hours we will be spending in the hospital when she goes into labor. And I'm so thankful to my husband for being not only my support during all of this but for being part of Steph's support system as well. I really did marry the greatest man on Earth. The birthing classes have been booked, the tour with the hospital scheduled, and the books regarding everything I should need to know have been purchased. (I'm considering taking a doolah class as well!) The only thing I don't have ready is the baby shower, or as I like to call it the Mama Shower.

In my experience these events have been uncomfortable, especially for the people who don't have children. No one likes going to them. Ever. So, for Steph's Mama Shower I'm making sure we're celebrating her and her baby. Our games, which Steph's mother came up with are adorable. And they're not embarassing! We're having two tables. The first table will be where party-goers can decorate onesies with fabric paint. The second table will have a list of letters and each person can take a letter, draw on a piece of paper the letter and an object to go with it and Steph's mother will later make it into a book to teach the baby her first words. Adorable, am I right? The food is going to be a barbeque. Everyone loves a barbeque. But the decorations, now that's my department. We already created the invitations! The colors on the invitations (A bright pink and purple) are the general color scheme I'm going with.

The invitations went out a few weeks ago. So now the decorating planning has begun. My lovely husband has been helping me with some ideas and execution of decorations. Below are some of my inspirations for the decorations at the party...

These little pom-poms are so cute for this party!

Minus the wire thing

I looooove this

And finally, my favorite part, the cupcakes. While cake would be just fine, cupcakes are generally slightly more labor intensive but leave less room for error (I have completely murdered my fair share of cakes that could not be saved with just some frosting). Being from the Seattle area, I know that the place to get cupcakes is Cupckake Royale. Unfortunately, I'm doing a lot of this planning in the most inexpensive way I can. James and I are saving to eventually move out his parents house (Way to suck, economy). So, I happened upon a website that had a recipe that Cupcake Royale uses. Here it is below.

Vanilla Buttercake Recipe
makes 1 dozen
2 3/4 c. Cake flour
2 3/4 c. Sugar
1 tsp Baking powder
1 tsp Salt
1/2 c. Local egg whites
1/2 c. Warm water
1/3 c. Sour cream
5 ounces Butter
3 tbs Expeller-pressed canola oil
1 tsp Vanilla Bean Pasted
Line a cupcake tin with your favorite cupcake wrappers, and set your oven to bake at 350 degrees. Combine dry ingredients in a mixer and mix on low speed. In a separate bowl, combine water and sour cream. Add vanilla paste and egg whites to this mixture and stir until combined. Add the butter, oil, and 1/4 of liquid mixture to your dry ingredients, and mix on low speed until moistened. Increase to medium speed and mix for one minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and gradually add the remainder of the liquid mixture in three doses, beating for 20 seconds after each dose. Scoop batter into wrappers. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes, or until edges are slightly golden. Set cupcakes aside until they are cool to the touch, then frost ‘em up with real buttercream.

I also found a video on how they get their signature frosting look!

If you've never had a cupcake from Cupcake Royale, you are missing out. They are beautiful, yummy, and just to die for. Truly. Here is an example from their website.

 Now that I have a bit of my plan laid out, it looks like it should be easy enough. And fun for everyone involved. Once the party planning starts to go into full swing, I'll be sure to take pictures (with my camera I'm ordering next week!) and post them on here!

Now it's time to relax in a bathtub! Have a lovely Sunday evening, my friends!